


Come Out, Come Out

by Anonymous



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, BAMF Castiel, Close Calls, Dark Jack Kline, Exhausted Castiel, Gen, Hurt Sam Winchester, Kidnapped Castiel, Medical Emergency, Prisoner Castiel, Protective Jack Kline, Scared Castiel, Scared Dean Winchester, Scared Sam Winchester, serious injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-03
Updated: 2019-04-03
Packaged: 2020-01-04 11:00:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18342323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: When Jack somehow imprisons Castiel in his head, out of a terrified urge to keep him safe from The Empty, the brothers have Rowena send them in after him.But the world in Jack’s head is not a safe place, and he is not in control of it as Sam finds out to his cost.Dean has to find a way to get his little brother out alive.





	Come Out, Come Out

Every time. Every time they think they’ve got rid of Lucifer, the bastard comes slipping out of the shadows at them, lying and manipulating and _using_ and one of these days, Dean will figure out how to put him down.

It’s not going to be today, though, because today he has his hands full with holding his little brother together and trying to make sure everything that’s _supposed_ to be inside him _stays_ inside him.

++  
 _Two hours earlier_

If they didn’t know better, Sam would have sworn they were still in the bunker.

Technically, they were, or at least their bodies were, but the halls he was slowly, carefully, exploring now were some place different entirely.

They were in Jack’s head, and that meant anything could happen.

He nudged open the door to the first dungeon, and paused on the threshold, peering into the shadows.

“Jack. Cas?”

No answer, just like every place he’d checked so far. But Jack and Cas had to be in here, somewhere. He hoped Dean, looking upstairs, had had better luck, but something was telling him otherwise.

Something was telling him that even if Cas did hear them, in here, Jack wouldn’t let him reply.

“Jack, I know you’re scared,” Sam said. “I know you don’t want anything to take Cas away from you. We don’t either, but this…. Jack, this isn’t how to protect him.”

Still no answer.

But Sam was sure Jack was listening. Right now, _outside_ , Rowena and Mary were standing watch over their three unconscious forms: he and Dean, because Rowena had found a way to send them in here, and Jack’s because he’d retreated inside himself, and hauled Cas physically, somehow, with him into this replica bunker, in an attempt to protect Cas from the entity in the Empty.

The kid had a ton of power, even after what Lucifer did, and that bastard knew just how to manipulate Jack into stepping over the line with it.

Like taunting them all about how he’d caused Cas’s current predicament by killing him in the first place, and how it was just a matter of time before that thing came for him again, and how nobody could protect Cas from it forever.

How much Cas would suffer when it got him the second, and last, time, and how it would never let him go.

And as soon as they’d got home, one of them had said something, him or Dean, he couldn’t remember which, and then Jack had just…

He’d pulled Cas into his arms, and then Cas was just gone, and Jack shut down on them.

Sam was just glad Rowena was there, because without her they’d never have known what happened, and they’d never have been able to get inside Jack’s head to fix it.

Or try to. Because they had to persuade Jack to let Cas go, and Sam had a feeling that was going to be difficult.

He opened the next dungeon door, and grimaced. It wasn’t like any room in the actual bunker; the walls were broken brick, stinking with damp, and heaps of rubble and smashed furniture covered much of the floor.

Jack was changing things, Sam guessed. It might be intentional: an attempt to confuse them, delay them, and keep them from Cas. Maybe even to try and scare them off.

 _Look what I can do. Give up._.

Well, Sam already knew what Jack could do, and so did Dean. Jack had reached into the Empty and woke Cas up. But no matter how powerful he was, they weren’t leaving here without their angel.

Cas had braved Hell, what, three times now, for them? No way they were abandoning him even if it was to Jack.

But the other option was that Jack might not be in control of himself right then, and that was somehow scarier.

Sam doubted Jack would consciously hurt either of them, but he was scared, and reacting, and if his powers got away from him…

Sam ventured a little further into the room.

“It’s going to be okay,” he said. “Jack, please trust us. We’ll find a way to protect Cas, but this…. This isn’t it, and you’re probably scaring him right now.”

God, Sam didn’t want to think what was going through Cas’s head, being held prisoner _again_ , and this time by someone he loved and had come to trust.

The walls around him creaked, suddenly, and Sam looked around him warily. 

And then, out of nowhere, he heard Cas screaming his name.

“Sam! Sam, run!”

He spun around; it had sounded like Cas was right there, but then a horrid splintering sound drew his attention back to the walls, and the ceiling.

A huge jagged crack bifurcated the room, tearing across the brick, and showering Sam with dust.

Sam bolted for the door, throwing himself through it and out into the corridor, just as the room collapsed in on itself with a deafening crash.

He covered his head until the sound faded, and the ground stopped shaking, and whatever fear-borne _tantrum_ Jack had just thrown was over.

And then he tried to stand.

That...that was a very bad idea.

++

They’ve been in bad situations before, that’s for sure.

Dean can think of a dozen without having to put any real effort in it; broken bones, open fractures, brain bleeds, some fucking eel monster that crawled into his gut once.

That’s before he even gets to the possessions, and the comas and the curses.

But somehow, this time, with his bunched up overshirt already soaked through, and Sam’s blood welling up around his hands, and his brother screaming, begging him to stop, while he stammers apologies and presses down _harder_...

Yeah, this might be the worst yet.

Because there’s no 911 service in Jack’s head. Paramedics aren’t going to come racing in with pressure bandages and a blue light ride to the nearest ER where somebody with a medical degree can save his little brother’s life.

And it needs saved, Dean’s sure of that. They might all be in Jack’s mental replica of the bunker, but Sam’s in real pain, and somehow Dean’s sure that’s real blood.

In here, anyway. And maybe out there, too, where maybe Mary’s doing the same damn thing he’s doing right now.

“Jack!” He screams to the kid, knows Jack is watching, listening, and what the hell is wrong with him that he’d do this. “Jack, help us! Come on, Jack, please!”

But maybe Jack’s too far gone to be reached, even if they _are_ inside him.

Too scared, too strong, too desperate.

Cas, though. Cas is in here too. And Cas is probably scared, and desperate, as well.

But Cas is also strong. Stronger when his back is to the wall.

 _Strongest_ when he has to be for them. When they need him.

Maybe it’s not Jack he should be calling for.

++

Sam opens his eyes.

There’s that one instant of confusion, his consciousness switching from _there_ to _here_ and then he remembers and he grabs frantically at his shirt.

“There, there, you’re fine, wee soul, you’re fine,” Rowena says, and she stops him tearing through the fabric to get to skin, to check and make sure he’s not torn open with his guts hanging out because debris from that collapsed room ripped a gap in him.

She seems to get he has to see and untucks his overshirt and tee, lifting them up because his hands are shaking too bad to do it himself.

There’s nothing. No gaping wound, he’s not bleeding out, he’s….

And then Dean’s there, grabbing him, hands framing his face, pulling Sam’s focus to him.

“You’re okay,” he says. “Sam, Sam, you’re fine, just look at me, okay?”

He does. He looks at Dean, and Dean’s there, Dean has him, and there’s movement over his shoulder, and Cas is standing there, looking like he’s about to drop, but he’s _there_ and Sam can hear Mary murmuring something, and a quiet sob in response and that, Sam figures, is Jack.

They’re all back, and they’re all okay, and…

He hurts.

The pain is sudden, sharp enough to lock him up, and he feels wet, tacky and wet, and Dean looks down first.

His brother’s face says it all, and it’s the last thing he sees, but the last thing he hears is Dean yelling his name and then begging Cas for help.

++

Dean sits quietly in their infirmary, watching as his brothers sleep.

Cas passed out right after healing Sam, and he’s on the bed on Dean’s left.

He’ll be okay, though, Rowena’s sure. Being _absorbed_ by a nephilim and held prisoner in his damn head, and then using all your energy to yank yourself and two other people out of there, and _then_ somehow finding more from somewhere to save somebody’s life…

That will take you out of the game for a while.

Sam…. Like Cas, he just needs to rest, get himself back together. So, while he’s doing that, Dean very gently wipes the last of the blood off his brother’s skin, covers him up with a blanket, does all the things he has to in order to reassure himself that Sam will be, that Sam _is_ okay.

And it helps distract him from their other problem.

What the fuck they’re going to do about Jack now.


End file.
